My Hinata nodded, and took her older self’s hand. “Exactly. Merging means we both live, big sister. But we have to be able to accept each other, and reconcile all our differences, or else we’ll just go nuts. Sakura makes it look easy because she has that freaky bloodline—”
“Hey!” I protested. “There’s nothing freaky about my bloodline. I’m just not exactly human, that’s all. It worked, by the way.”
“I knew you’d be fine,” Hinata said with a smile. “You always are.”
“Well, I’m glad,” Naruto sighed in relief. “I was a little worried that it was taking so long. What do you think about this thing with Hinata?”
I frowned. “I’m not sure if they can pull it off, actually. Aside from my bloodline, the fact that I know my true name really helps. Neither of them is a child, so without that advantage it could be dangerous.”
“But I do know my name,” the elder Hinata began.
“Yes, don’t you remember?” My own Hinata broke in. “You said it, when you gave my soul to Naruto. My name is Hinata.”
“…yes,” the elder Hinata agreed, a bit startled. She paused, and shook her head ruefully. “I spend decades meditating to find my name, and Sakura casually gives it to you. Typical.”
“There’s a reason she’s my treasure,” my Hinata said smugly. “Are we going to do this?”
The elder Hinata turned to Naruto. “Is this what you want?”
“It’s the best solution I’ve heard,” he said seriously. “I think she can help you a lot, and between that and Sakura’s help we should be able to undo everything that bastard did to you. But that’s not something I’d force on you. If you don’t want to, we’ll find another way to work things out.”
“Thank you, Naruto-sama. I am unworthy of your kindness. But if you are willing to allow this…”
She turned to her younger self, and put her hands on her shoulders. “Little sister, in the last ten minutes I’ve seen more happiness in your life that mine has held in years. Yes. Please. Join with me, and show me how you find such joy in life. Fill my heart with your love, and take my strength for your own, and we shall live on together as one. Perhaps one day I shall even find a way to apologize properly for all the trouble I’ve caused.”
My Hinata smiled. “It’s ok. I know exactly how to make it up to them. Here I come.”
Her body was just a shadow clone, so it vanished when she abandoned it to dive into her older self’s mindscape. A moment later the remaining Hinata swayed, and would have fallen if Naruto hadn’t caught her.
I pulled myself to my feet, and stumbled a few steps to lean against him myself.
“I’m feeling pretty funky,” I told him. “I’ve lost a lot of strength, but at least I’m completely alive again instead of being stuck as some kind of ghost kami. Thank you, my love. I don’t think I would have thought of that.”
“Outside the box is my specialty,” he replied with a relieved smile. “You ok in there, Hinata?”
She looked up at him, and her eyes went wide. “I love you,” she said dreamily. Then her gaze turned to me. “I love you, too. I didn’t know I could belong to two people at once.”
Naruto chuckled. “We love you too, you sweet little woobie assassin.”
Hinata sighed happily, and melted into our shared embrace.
“See Sakura, I told you everything would work out. I’m going to marry you girls, and you’re both going to have your fairytale ending no matter what.”
“Now, any ideas on what to do with Sasuke? Either of you?”
I thought about it. We needed to reset at least once more, or our lives in Konoha were going to be a complete mess. But how could we do that without freeing Sasuke to cause more trouble? Was there some loophole in the wish? I dredged up a little chakra to feed into my heaven seal, artificially sharpening my wits as I contemplated the wording. Naruto had said, ‘I just wish we could go back and fix everything…’
Wait a minute.
“I’m an idiot,” I groaned. “Why didn’t I ever see that? Argh! By the time I heard the wording I was so stuck on this time loop idea that it went right past me!”
“What did?” Naruto asked in confusion.
“You didn’t wish for something to be done to you, Naruto. You wished for the power to do it yourself. I’m right, aren’t I Astoria?”
“Oh, I can’t say anything about that with mortals present,” she protested virtuously. “Not without express permission from the senior local-world kami—”
“I give you permission! Now answer the question, wench.”
She laughed. “Yes, you’ve got it right. There’s no such thing as a time loop, heroes. The wish gave Naruto the power to travel back in time to a designated save point at will, and he can share that ability with those closest to him. But mortals usually have trouble controlling such gifts, so it looks like the wishgiver system set it up to run automatically for you unless you change it. It picked the save point and companions you were thinking of at the time, and set your power to activate automatically if anything happened that would definitely require another reset to fix. But all of that is subject to change. That’s how Hinata was brought in, actually. The system selected Naruto’s closest peers initially, but when he fell in love with her she was added automatically.”
“Wait, does that mean there are looping copies of everyone else I’ve ever gotten close to out there?” Naruto asked, suddenly concerned.
“No, no, the wish’s power budget will only stretch to four people,” Astoria reassured him. “And it won’t kick anyone out unless you’re very explicit about wanting them gone, since there’s no way to take that back once you’ve reset. So it’s just the four of you unless you kick someone out to make room.”
“I’m kicking Sasuke out,” Naruto said firmly. “That nutcase is not one of my precious people, and he’s not included in my wish.”
“That did it,” Astoria chirped happily. “Now the next time you reset he won’t go with you, so this version of Sasuke will just vanish from the time stream. Perhaps he’ll do better with his life the next time around.”
“Oh, he’s not getting off that easy,” my demon aspect said. “My chakra is still pure black, so I count as a full demon, and I’ve got just enough power left to take him where he belongs. Who wants to do the honors?”
I hesitated, that damned gold chakra making me reluctant to kill a helpless foe. Besides, was he really to blame? He’d spent decades with the seal and his Sharingan and the Curse of Despair all competing to drive him into darkness. Could anyone have resisted that? But then again, was I really going to make excuses for a man who’d done the things he’d done? Does it matter what your reasons are, when you’ve done things that most demons wouldn’t have the stomach for?
Hinata glanced at me, realized why I was dithering, and stepped up to drive a crackling spike of chakra through the asshole’s brain in one fluid motion.
“Perfect,” my demon aspect said. She reached into Sasuke’s bloody corpse, and dragged his soul out by the throat.
“Ready for your final reward, little man?” She taunted him. “Do you have any idea how much trouble you’re in? Screwing this thing up is not going to make the big shots happy with you, and you’ve made sure you deserve anything they want to do to you. I think you’re in for a lot of close, personal attention.”
The terror in his eyes as he scrabbled uselessly at her hand made me positively tingly inside. Then I felt guilt at enjoying another’s misfortune, followed by irritation at myself. That stupid gold chakra was still messing with my head pretty badly, but at least I had a little bit of blue now to balance it.
“You can’t!” Sasuke protested. “They’ll punish you too.”